Sunday, 27 August 2017

A short but sweet time beneath the Wild Atlantic Way

A
short but sweet time beneath the Wild Atlantic Way

By Niamh Brown & Josh Baker

Hi everyone! We’re Niamh and Josh, an
oceanographer and marine biologist going into our final years studying in
Plymouth, UK. We’re both really interested in all things marine, be it scuba
diving, rock-pooling or (as Niamh delicately puts it) throwing expensive
monitoring equipment off the side of boats! What attracted us to Sea Synergy
was the education and research efforts. I’m lucky enough to be able to use the
cetacean data that Sea Synergy collect for my dissertation, some research that
will hopefully be beneficial to the local area.

This
is both of our first times (that we can remember) in Ireland, and certainly the
first time in Co. Kerry. The landscape is so impressive, especially compared to
where I come from in East Anglia, where the terrain closely resembles a crêpe! I was lucky enough to get out to the Skelligs last weekend, and
the views were truly breath-taking! The phrase goes that there is no such thing
as bad weather, just inappropriate clothing, and we’ve both been caught out by
that once or twice in the time we’ve been here, the viewing point for seal
surveys is certainly a soggy place when you forget some waterproofs!

It’s such a shame that we get to spend so
little time here, everything we’ve been doing has been so much fun! I’ve
particularly enjoyed the Seashore Safaris, seeing children’s faces light up as
they see and touch some sea creatures for the first time is truly incredible,
and it’s great to hear the little snippets of information that each person
brings.

Last weekend we had to say good-bye to Cian
and Heather, which was surprisingly hard given we’d only known them for 10
days! It did have a slight upside in that we could move into the house, instead
of camping! We’re all going to a pub quiz at the community centre this week,
which should be entertaining.

It’s going to be difficult saying good-bye
to this place next week, but we’re both making sure we’re getting as much out
of every minute as possible for the time we have left!